


Every Storm is a Serenade

by mx_vertiginous



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Boss/Employee Relationship, Developing Relationship, Emotionally Repressed, F/F, Gender Issues, I lean way too heavily on ocean imagery, Implied Hastur/Ligur - Freeform, Oral Sex, Poor Life Choices, Power Dynamics, Semi-Public Sex, She/Her Pronouns for Dagon (Good Omens), Vaginal Fingering, Ze/Zir Pronouns for Beelzebub (Good Omens), befriending flies, eating frogs, gender fluidity, wall kiss, workaholic Dagon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-23
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2020-07-11 20:11:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19933810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mx_vertiginous/pseuds/mx_vertiginous
Summary: Dagon has spent several millennia devoted to the sin of Ambition, that unholy union of Greed and Pride.  They've made a name for themselves in Hell, but unfortunately, making a name for oneself gets one noticed.  Which can make things complicated.Basically, an origin story for Beelzebub & Dagon's relationship (which they still won't define for me, their sorry scribe. I'm loathe to call it a romance because Dags will bite me).  Set in the 18th century.  Lots of fun bits about how Hell ended up with a bureaucracy in the first place.Please jump to Chapter 2 if you don't care about my pretentious telling of Dagon's backstory.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> It may seem like I'm playing fast and loose with pronouns at the beginning, but it's intentional, and will be explained later. For now, just accept that Dagon is non-binary and uses different pronouns at different times in their life. Which is many centuries long. Because they're a fallen angel. You'd change your pronouns too if you were that old.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prologue: Some sketches from Dagon's backstory, covering from about the time of The Fall until somewhere about the birth of Christ.

**Part 1:**  
What do you do the day after you’ve fallen from grace? 

It was the very first day of the rest of their lives, and not a single fallen angel had a clue what to do next. Their rebellion quelled, their forces scattered; one by one they found themselves coming back to consciousness in a new dimension of the world, a Hell that hadn’t existed yesterday.

The generals acted quickly to fill the power vacuum and consolidate power under Satan himself. Some particularly enterprising superior demons struck out for greener pastures and declared themselves as demigods; trying (mostly unsuccessfully) to establish dominion over geographies beyond the modest bounds of Europe and Western Asia. 

Most of the infernal foot soldiers set up camp among the bogs and grime; nurturing their petty grievances against heaven, against hell, against anyone and anything they could blame for their fate. 

But for many of the surviving field officers and gendarmes, the forecast was less defined. They awoke disoriented, their cause obliterated, their friends and deputies, vassals and thralls slaughtered, and their whole universe altered forever. It would be easy to flop face down in the muck with their men and drink themselves into oblivion, and certainly some had. But others found themselves still in fully in thrall of sins that wouldn’t allow for such rest. 

They would spend the next three millennia clawing for status like crabs in a bucket.

* * *

**Part 2:**  
Dagon opened their eyes and stared at the roiling black-grey skies. The air sizzled that brittle-drycold of the desert in winter. They took in a long deep breath to clear their mind, but winced in pain. By all guesses it was a fractured rib. Or three. Or maybe five? They wondered, idly, if they had retained the ability to mend them; what exactly had lost when they were cast out? But at the moment, despair prevented even the simple, atom-by-atom effort of reknitting bone.

It was easier just not to breathe. 

They laid there, in the bone-dry, rocky desert for what seemed like an eternity. Eyes wide open, lungs shut. 

Mind chipping away at the problem of their continued existence.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. The forces of hell had been on the cusp of victory. Dagon had been a general in the heat of the battle, leading their legion to victory when? What had happened? Events lingered like clouds in the back of their mind, unformed fog and shadows. But they had no force of will enough to make them coalesce into any sensible form.

A century into this half-conscious dream, Dagon came to a decision. They reached out with what power they had left, and knit together their ribs. Took a solid deep breath of acrid air, and stood up.

An acorn of ambition had taken root in their soul and they were ready to take on this new world.

* * *

**Part 3:**  
Mid-level management was possibly the worst venue for ambition that had ever existed on Earth, in Heaven, or in Hell. But into this bleak void, Dagon stepped with purpose. They had chosen their field of battle, and it would ultimately be theirs. If for no other reason than the absolute lack of competition. A less ambitious demon would have steered clear of VS&PT. It was not a prestigious position. But Dagon saw clearly, that it was a perfect beginning; entirely because it was relatively trivial. It was a blink of an eye, maybe less than a century really, before they had worked their way up from a simple scribe, to an auditor in the department of Venial Sins and Petty Temptations, and from there to director of a small cadre of infernal auditors.

Others would it out for a millennia over high profile positions in the Department of Artistic Temptations, or Demonic Consular Affairs. Dagon quietly took over ownership of what would (eventually) be the highest volume department in hellish administration.

* * *

**Part 4**  
At least, Dagon thought to himself, all that time on earth had not been a total waste. His stint as a Philistine demigod had been unremarkable… or at least he hoped that it would remain unremarkable as far as Hell was concerned. Mistakes had been made, quite a lot of them, but Dagon being Dagon, all his missteps had been well covered up. After the first few centuries, he had taken to the seas for all but feast days, figuring it was better to stay to himself, than to keep mucking around in the lives of men, and inadvertently doing them good. Well. Sort of good. Doing them a something.

The decision to go to earth as a mer-god, however, had been a stroke of genius. It gave Dagon a pretence for taking off on his own to have a proper good think in the ocean. A more adventurous demon would have fucked off from their duties to have a nice long scenic swim in the South Pacific. But not Dagon. Dagon wasn’t sightseeing, Dagon was plotting. 

The gears of the world were grinding ever so slightly faster towards the Apocalypse, he could feel it. They all could feel it. Events were moving slowly now, but they would be picking up steam. If Dagon wanted to keep up, if he wanted to excel, to succeed, to lead the Legions of Hell into the end of it all… well… 

If an idle mind was the Devil’s workshop, then maybe Lucifer was onto something when he sent Dagon up to earth with little to do but dwell on his own ambitions.


	2. For a Minute There, I Lost Myself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dagon works late and gets an unexpected visitor and encounters unexpected feels. 
> 
> The story actually picks up here, you can ignore the prologue if you just want to jump into the action.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pronoun note: For this chapter Dagon is consistently she/her from the POV of the narrator, Beelzebub is zie/zir, any other demons are consistently they/them.
> 
> Style note (if you care, which I do): Fashion in Hell lags a good 20-30 years behind human style, both of our friends here are in menswear roughly pre-Beau Brummel... think Aziraphale in a French Prison only much, much grimier. And, of course, flies.

It was 2am, and Dagon was thankful her infernal body didn’t exactly need sleep. Sleep was nice of course, no point in turning down a solid night of sloth. But it was late autumn in the early years of the 19th century, and crop failures were raging across Northern Europe; resulting not just in famine, but a spattering of small wars. Not that any of Europe was stable following the French Revolution, and this was exactly Dagon’s problem. From a compliance perspective all of this was a nightmare to nail down. Which demons were to be credited with which miseries was becoming almost impossible to untangle. That asshole Famine always complicated everything, once a human was starving most any other temptation became nigh irresistible.

The demons assigned to specific tasks would howl in outrage if partial credit was assigned to a higher-order hellish force. However, without an appropriate adjustment coefficient, deeds would be double-counted, and that would wreak havoc with year-end accounting. 

Dagon was so terribly preoccupied with working out the flaws in her equations that she hadn’t quite registered an unusual presence in her office. She was a good hour into mumbling through the algebra and swatting away flies before it dawned on her: whoever she was talking at was actually making encouraging noises! She had assumed it was Hastur, they were always hanging around at inopportune times making everyone around them miserable. But this was, well, not Hastur. Hastur was a colossal asshole. 

She looked up from her work, and registered the cloud of flies.

Dagon stuttered, “Lord Beelzebub? I’m sorry my lord, I was preoccupied.” This was highly unusual. Most of Dagon’s encounters with the Prince of Hell had been for various ceremonies and commendations. She had a foggy memory that they had chatted drunkenly at a few of Lucifer’s soirees. Every time she’d gotten a queasy feeling in their stomach, as if it was full of writhing eels. 

That was how bodies worked right? Humans, she remembered, would go prostrate at the feet of the rulers. Even pass out. A natural reaction to sovereginity. 

“Quite alright, I’m pleazzzed to see any demon so occupied by sinz and temptationz.” Zie glanced around at the grimy office, filled with scrolls and old clay tablet piled up willy-nilly; in the back corner an entire shelving unit had just slid sideways and dumped it contents on the floor “Quite frankly, no one elzzze really bothers. And various advizzzors have been telling me that what you’re doing here is going to be terribly important. Eventually.”

Dagon hoped so. Much of the department’s ‘work’ was throwing tired bodies at the same tasks they had been up to for centuries. The more people under her, the more important she looked. But all that busywork was a smokescreen for real work in advanced accounting techniques tackled by just a handful of particularly talented Demons, herself included. 

“I hope it will be, the world is spinning faster than ever towards the End Times. I can feel it.”

Beelzebub nodded knowingly. Zie felt it too... all of Hell did, and Heaven must as well. 

“And if we really want to get a handle on what’s been happening, if we really need to know where the scales stand with our adversaries before the final battles, well… somebody needs to track it.” This was a golden opportunity to boost her work and she wasn’t about to let it slip through her fingers on account of nerves. 

“Quite right,” Beelzebub replied drily, “And you’re just about the only demon I’d trust with it.”

A little lump caught in Dagon’s throat. She hadn’t quite realized that anyone else had particularly noticed. Particularly not anyone as high up as Beelzebub.

“Zzzhow me, how it works.”

“My prince, there’s math. Complicated math. I’m not sure I can explain.” Especially not at 3am, when she’d already spent hours pouring over charts and graphs. Plus, she had little clue whether Beelzebub had even the most rudimentary maths lesson under zir belt. 

“Zzzhow me!” Not a request, a command.

The lump in Dagon’s throat made as if to choke her. But she knew better than to argue, zir word was law. So, with beads of sweat curdling on her scales, she started working through the pile of vellum sheets as best she could. There were maps covered in wooden tokens. And graphs. A multi-year timeline. A copy of of Euclid’s Geometry lay half open on the table. And long equations were scribbled out on a slate, so that she could erase and rewrite them as needed. 

It was hard to tell how much Beelzebub was following any of it, but zie made interested noises at all the appropriate parts.

“And that is how I **hope** we can make an accurate accounting of which compound percentage of the events of the last 30 years can be attributed to ordinary demonic influence and which percentages are more rightly assigned to… to War… and…. Now to Famine,” she concluded, her voice trailing off at the end. “Shit…” 

She erased a couple of numbers, scribbled a bit more in the margins and replaced them with a better estimate.

“I’m sorry, my lord,” she pressed a pained hand to her forehead, “it might be better for me to try and explain this at another time, it’s not all worked out yet.”

“You often work late here alone like thizzz?” Beelzebub went for a closer look at the slate she had been working on, leaning zir shoulder into Dagon’s. 

“It’s um… strategic planning?” She struggled to keep her composure, but Beelzebub was so close she could smell the soft fragrance of mildew and brimstone wafting from zir skin. The room wobbled slightly.

“Zzztregic planning?” Beelzebub turned zir face up towards Dagon, close… too very close Dagon could see clearly that zir eyes…

“Your eyes…” she gasped. Zir eyes that looked so human, were actually a million minuscule compound eyes, arranged into a human looking iris. They glittered ever so slightly in the lantern-light. 

Dagon was so captivated, she missed the shifting expression on Beelzebub’s face.

Zie chucked dryly, “I sometimes forget they look different up closez. And that not everyone knowz. You’ve never noticed?”

Dagon shook her head dumbly. She had never really seen Beelzebub up close like this, not sober at least, and it was like looking at the sun. Zir glittery eyes seemed to bore into the dark back reaches of her brain.

She flinched slightly when Beelzebub raised a hand to her cheek, curious fingers feeling out the topography of scales on her face. “I’ve alwayz been fond of you…”

 _Always seems unlikely_ , whispered a soft voice in the back of her brain. But other long dormant voices were screaming louder. _Ego, Desire, Craving, Lust._ Dagon gaped open mouthed. She was barely aware of these feelings within herself, anymore. They had been suppressed by centuries of raw ambition. 

“You’re allowed to be fond of someone?”

Beelzebub gave a sarcastic snort, “Allowed? I’m the Prinzzze of Hell… I’m allowed whatever I damn well please.”

There mere idea of doing what she damn well pleased hit Dagon like a firework. 4000 years of compressed emotions came screaming out of her subconscious. She didn’t understand what emotion it was that grabbed Beelzebub by the lapels and shoved zir against the wall, but it was definitely Lust that kissed zir, long and hard, all soft lips and fish-sharp teeth, and happily buzzing flies clouding around them both. 

And then the clutch engaged, the emergency-brake of her brain slammed down, and she realized what she had done. The last emotion slithered out of the deepest recesses of her brain: Shame. 5000 years of hard work down the drain. What had she done? Hands trembling she let zir loose and stepped backwards… staring at the floor. Terrified.

After the longest 5 seconds ever to exist in 6000 years of time itself, a fly landed on her nose and Dagon dared to look up. 

The Prince of Hell was grinning at her like a smug child who had just won a carnival prize.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title: Karma Police by Radiohead


	3. You'll Come Apart or You'll Go Black

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dagon spends a very uncomfortable staff meeting contemplating their fate.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please hang tight on the pronouns my friends, the next chapter will have more explanation, plus an end note for clarity.

The conference room was incredibly stuffy. Summer had not come, and this year it wouldn’t. Out of respect for the large number of cold-blooded demons, Hell had kept the indoor brimstone running since last September. Dagon found the heat and fumes unbearable. 

In front of the overcrowded room, the regional director for Scandinavian operations, Sir Vorms was giving a report on the magnitude of crop failures across Northern Europe. As far as Dagon was concerned, he could have been droning on complete gibberish. Her temples were starting to throb with a nascent migraine, and she thought could always review her secretary’s notes later. In her own quarters. With the windows open and a chill breeze. Maybe a bourbon and soda, if her headache had cleared out enough by then.

In any case, her mind was as far as it could possibly be from the stifling and incredibly boring meeting. So far off in fact, that when the door of the conference room cracked open, and a demon slid into the back of the room, Dagon didn’t actually even notice. Though to be fair, Vorms had continued in exactly the same tone, as if nothing had happened; something about livestock losses and the effect on the woolen trade in Iceland. It was only when demons on the far end of the conference table began rudely murmuring, that Dagon bothered to glance around. 

To her alarm, she saw that the visitor had been preceded by a cloud of flies. Beelzebub. What in the Nine Circles of Hell was zie doing here? _Oh._ Dagon put two and two together, and her gut twisted. 

She hadn’t seen Beelzebub since that night in the office. The night where she had, most unfortunately, lost control of herself. And, while there could be many reasons that the Prince of Hell would check into a departmental board meeting, zie never had before. Their presence now could not bode well. For Dagon at least. Maybe it would bode well enough for whoever would be replacing her. 

Vorms seemed to be the only one at the table that hadn’t actually noticed their visitor, and when he finished his report on the expected effects of the current weather phenomenon on subsistence in Iceland and Greenland, he looked around proudly, as if he took all the whispering to have been about him. 

As if anyone really cared.

Dagon forced her face back into it’s usual bored mask, “Next on the agenda, I believe we have… hmmm…” she made a great show of checking the prepared outline, “The demon Nerik with a report on this year’s flooding of the Nile delta. That is, of course, if our guest doesn’t mind us moving forward without interruption. We have quite a full meeting this month, and I can give our Lord of Flies some time to speak… ah, yes, I think we have some time after Dion’s estimates of the effect of crop failures on brewing and winemaking with an eye towards the attenuation of drunken brawls in Q1 through Q4 of next year. Would that be acceptable my Prince?”

She flinched a bit over how frightfully familiar those last two worlds sounded in her mouth. But no point now. She couldn’t take them back.

“Pleazzze continue.”

And for the next hour, Dagon made herself dutifully appear alert and engaged while internally she was screaming at herself. The department had a short discussion on the expected effects of the weather event on subsistence fishing, while she internally debated how much hotter the pits of hell were than this infernal conference room. She took a break from ruminating on how badly she had fucked up, to suggest that the North American team reschedule their human migration report until next month, since they really should have prepared their maps by now. And then she spent the entirety of Dion’s presentation ruminating on who in this room would be promoted to replace her. And what their vulnerabilities were. And whether or not she would have enough time, once she got out of the brimstone pits, to depose them before the apocalypse. 

“And that is why I believe the reduction in the human population due to famine will outpace diminished alcohol productions, and I confidently predict that the attenuation in alcohol related sins and temptations will be proportionate to the reduction in population and will not require a significant coefficient of correction in fiscal year 1817.” 

Most of the conference table, Dagon noted proudly, were half asleep. Which at least made her look alert in comparison.

“Yes, well, thank you Dion. We appreciate the thoughtful forecast. Now, our esteemed visitor, Beelzebub Prince of Hell, did you have any, um… announcements?” Dagon gripped the edge of the table so hard that the knuckles of her fingers went white.

“Announcementz? No.” Zir delivery was flat. Emotionless. “No announcementz, juzzt, well… good work. I know thizz is a busy year for compliance and, thank you for hastenzing the apocalypse. Hail Satan.”

“Hail Satan,” the demons all recounted in unison, the customary end of meeting salute. 

Beelzebub remained in the doorway, making small talk to Dagon’s staff as they filed out. Dagon remained seated at the table, waiting. Steeling herself. For whatever was coming next.

Once the last of the demons had left, Beezelbub crossed the room and pulled up a chair next to the head of the table. 

“We zzzhould talk.”

“Talk, yes.” Dagon gulped. Her eyes went to the door, which had been left ajar. She could see Ligur lurking around out there on some pretext, to listen, and some other demon with him, hidden behind the door, but probably not out of earshot. Hopefully, this was a simple work conversation after all. 

Beelzebub reached across the table and took her hand. “I want to zzzeee you again. You’ve been avoiding me.”

In the doorway Dagon could see Ligur’s chameleon spin an eye in their direction. Damn.

“Look, this is not the best place to have this conversation. I don’t know why you think I’m avoiding you, but… I assure you. That. We should have this conversation elsewhere.” She tried to gracefully wrest her hand away from Beelzebub’s grip without making any movement large enough to be seen from the doorway.

The Prince of Hell held her hand firm. “Elzewhere?” Zie buzzed an abstract meditative hum. “Brilliant idea, dinner at my place? Say seven thiz evening?”

Dagon flushed ice blue, the blood rushing from her face. There wasn’t any good answer to that. “Dinner tonight?”, she stammered weakly.

“Zzzzee you then.” 

Beelzebub stood, and clearly visible from the doorway, bent over and kissed Dagon on the forehead. She was briefly enveloped in a cloud of flies, and then suddenly Beelzebub magicked zirself alway and she was left alone.

Weakly, she looked up at the doorway where half her office staff peered at her in open curiosity. 

A long moment passed, before Dagon barked, in the most commanding voice she could summon “Get back to work!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title: Fade Into You by Mazzy Star


	4. The Recklessness of Water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dagon may be a functional C-Suite executive, but socially she's an awkward disaster... even by hell's standards. 
> 
> And we get a proper introduction to The Swarm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pronouns: Most of this is Beelzebub's POV and zie refers to Dagon using they/them at this point in the story.

* * *

A soft haze clung to the bogs, lit orange by the dwindling sunlight. Fog, Smoke, Sulphur. The whole of the swamp was heated by the brimstone mines, and even in autumn the air was muggy and wet, like midsummer in the American south. 

Dinner had been served on Beelzebub’s back porch, where the air was fresher and cooler, but Dagon couldn’t help but to keep stealing glances towards the sprawling swamp that bordered zir tidy lawn. It chirped and croaked and called with the voices of a million tasty things. Not that the roasted squab they’d eaten hadn’t been delicious, not that Beelzebub’s servant, Zurgat, hadn’t brought perfectly mixed cocktails, not that the company wasn’t a damn sight better than another late night dinner at the office.

But there was a lake. And a swamp beyond it. It called to her. 

* * *

The evening, Beelzebub thought to zirself, had gone swimmingly. Zie disliked having people in zir house, but Dagon was more than agreeable to dinner in the garden. The night was quiet and peaceful. The Swarm had gone off to play in the lake on the edge of the swamps, leaving only a few free range gnats buzzing around their dinner and sipping water off their sweaty cocktails. 

They had both shed their jackets and vests in the warmth blowing off the swamp and Dagon sprawled casually in a deck chair all scale-speckled long legs, grimy ruffled shirt and loose coral-blonde hair. Beelzebub had to stop zirself 3 or 4 times from reaching out and running zir fingers through their curls it was so tempting, but zie reminded zirself that was not the game. The power trip where The Prince of Hell could order people to jump into bed with zir had soured a couple centuries in. The game, as it had been for millenia, was to get someone else to make the first move. And so far, zie was losing with Dagon… but the night was still young. 

Once Zurgat had cleared the remnants of dinner, their conversation fell quiet, enough that Beelzebub could hear the chirping of crickets in the swamp. 

“I’ve been wanting to ask you something a little odd.” Dagon ventured.

Beelzebub replied hopefully, “What’s that?”

Dagon leaned in as if this was quite serious, and perhaps private, their eyes met. “Your pond at the edge of the swamp there, is it deep?”

“Deep? Why, do you need to hide a body?” Beelzebub gave a buzzing laugh.

In the fading light zie could see them blanche grey, their fishy eyes slid sideways. “I mean, is it deep enough to swim in?”

“I think so. You want to have a Zwim?” Beelzebub smiled indulgently. No harm in that even if it was indeed an odd request. “I’m not sure I have a bathing costume, though… I can go see and maybe get you towelz…”

But Dagon was already gone, striding down the hill to the shore, loosening their cravat, kicking off their shoes. At the edge of the shore they stripped naked, dropped their clothes in a pile on a rock, then in a quick flash of glittering scales, they disappeared under the surface of the water. Halfway across the pond there was a ripple beneath the surface, a rustling in the reeds at the far end, and then nothing. They were gone.

Zurgat came outside with a tray of coffee, “My lords… um… Sir, where’d they go.”

Beelzebub stood there dumbfounded, and pointed at the swamp. 

“They’re in the swamp?” Even by the anemic rules of infernal etiquette, that was highly unusual. “They just took off?”

“No,” Beelzebub sighed regretfully and finally sat down, reaching for the whiskey and pouring zirself another tumblerfull. “I told them they could. Sort of. “ 

There was a crocodilian scream from somewhere out in the swamp. The bog creatures suddenly went silent, and when they started back again, bit-by-bit, some of the usual voices were missing. Flies started arriving, a couple at first, and then a good half of The Swarm were back and buzzing with news and opinions. 

The Swarm was usually just background noise. Beelzebub could feel them, but they were most often at odds with one another, so the whole of them just came off as a soft static. Flies were simple creatures, their emotions were not complex, and each one only contained an atom of it. But once in a blue moon, they would all direct their attention to the same thing, more or less, enough to give an impression. Danger usually, sometimes distrust. Or simple fear. But today, they came buzzing back from the bogs with one emotion: Love. 

A dreamy smile spread across Beelzebub’s face as zie tried to work out what exactly the flies were thinking and why. “She ate a frog… no… several frogs… Ripped them apart with those… zzzzz…. Teeth.” 

Zie had to admit they did have nice teeth.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Zurgat interrupted zir reveries “Who? Ate what?”

“Oh, Dagon… The Swarm call them ‘her’ for some reason. They ate a bunch of live frogs and the flies are delighted. Obviously.” A smile still played across zir face. It was impossible not to be infected by the swarm’s mood, when they were buzzing gleefully and gamboling all around zir head.

The surface of the pond rippled once more, and suddenly Dagon arose out of the water, their lanky body streaked with mud, clumps of moss clinging to their breasts and reeds tangled in their long hair, not unlike a savage version of the Birth of Venus. They grabbed their discarded clothes, but didn’t bother to dress, striding back up to the porch with the remainder of The Swarm buzzing after them.

Beelzebub heard Zurgat snap for a bath towel, then murmur “Well, that was downright feral,” before retreating back into the house. 

Dagon whisked the neatly folded towel off their chair and dried their face, streaking mud all over it. “Thanks, I mean… for the towel, and also for letting me have a swim. I don’t much get out of the office and it was… well it was nice.”

“It’zzz nothing,” Beelzebub tried to respond casually, but zir voice betrayed zir buzzing thoughts. Cautiously, zie reached over and picked a large vine off the scarred stubs where wings had been. “We can make an arrangement if you’d like to come use the pond more often?”

“I don’t know that I would have time for it much, but that would be wonderful.”

There was something different about them, Beelzebub thought, like a restlessness had been satisfied. They were a little less anxious and less brittle, less eager to please. The calmness wrapped gracefully around their broad shoulders as they slumped back in the chair, stretched out their long legs and reached for their (now watery) drink. 

_Bring the other them back,_ a little voice in zir head taunted, _pick at them, bring them down a notch, make them deficient again._ After all, a needy demon was a demon that could be twisted around to zir own purposes and desires. Whatever sick confidence this was, Beelzebub feared it wouldn’t play at zir little game. 

“Didn’t you used to have a man’s body? “ Zir tone was conversational, but zie was probing for a tender spot. 

Dagon shrugged casually, “A long time ago. Bodies drift.”

“Bodies _drift?_ What does that mean?” 

For the most part, fallen angels chose their shape and form. There were limits of course, all of them were marked one way or another by the act of falling, and there were certain actions that couldn’t be undone. But _drift?_ Maybe the hermits and bog witches let their bodies drift, but most of the social demons at least cared enough to keep up appearances.

“It means I have better things to do that think about how my body is configured. I mean, I have to check in now and then to make sure the gills aren’t growing back inconveniently. But the human bits? For a while I made an effort to magic them away, but it wasn’t really worth it.” Dagon took a philosophical sip of their whiskey.

The one response that Beelzebub had not anticipated was indifference. Zie tried to press the matter further, “The Swarm calls you ‘she’.”

“The flies talk to you?” Dagon sat up at that revelation and leaned closer.

It was Beelzebub’s turn at nonchalance, “Of course they do. I mean, most of the time they cancel each other out, but when they have an opinion, I can understand them.”

“And they were talking to you about me?”

This conversation had taken a very unanticipated left turn. “I mean, you ate a frog. They hate the frogs.”

Dagon’s face shifted focus to the cloud around zir head, the flies rollicked and looped and a number of them flew off to fly around Dagon as well. This elicited a sharp toothy grin as if they were absolutely delighted by The Swarm. “You guys can call me ‘she’ if you want, friends do.”

Beelzebub felt the conversation sliding out from under zir, for Lucifer’s sake, they were talking to The Swarm! No one in their right mind talked to the flies. “What about me, do I count as a friend?”

“What?” Dagon seemed shaken by this.

“You said that friends call you ‘she’ and you said The Swarm could, but, what about me?” It was a petty, bratty thing to say, but zie was pissy that Dagon was flirting more with the flies then they were with zirself. 

This had the intended effect, as Dagon squirmed in their seat, eyes suddenly downcast, and started picking nervously at a patch of scales on their arm. “You? I don’t know. I guess you can call me whatever you wish, you’re the Prince of Hell, it’s up to you to decide if we’re friends, really.”

“I wasn’t asking what I want, I was asking what you wanted,” and there zie had hit a raw nerve. 

Dagon looked away and busied themselves sorting their clothes out, a flush creeping across their cheeks. “Don’t need to want anything m’lord. Nothing good comes of wanting.” 

And Beelzebub was more than ready to press zir advantage, but there was suddenly a spate of yelling from inside the house, and a gangly little fiend came running out, Zurgat in full pursuit. “I told you, little bastard, you can’t just run in…”

The creature crawled up on Dagon’s lap, and spat out a stream babble so quickly that Beelzebub had little clue what the hell was going on. Dagon seemed to understand them though, and patted their head calmly, “It’s fine, Uruk, you did fine coming to get me. You could have given them a note though, instead of breaking in.”

“It tried to give me a thing, sir, called it ‘male,’ but I’d never seen anything with all those sigils and it looked cursed.” Zurgat explained.

Uruk produced a scrap of paper. 

“Oh, I see.” Dagon read over the note, rose, and gathered up their boots. They made a face as if to screw up their courage. “I’m sorry, my Prince, but Famine needs me to go over some figures. His time is limited these days, and he indicated it was urgent.” They glanced at the interlopers, looking at both of them expectantly, “I’m sorry to walk out on… whatever this is. Dinner was lovely, and I can’t thank you enough for letting me have a swim. But, I have a job to do.”

 _A job you assigned to yourself,_ Beelzebub thought bitterly. But there was no point in saying that aloud in front of onlookers. Zie tried to throttle the annoyance in zir voice,“You’re not even going to bother to ask my leave?”

This stopped Dagon in their tracks; they swayed slightly on their feet, boots dangling from one hand. Beelzebub could see the struggle on their face as they weighed their options. Finally, after a long frozen moment, they sank onto one knee, still juggling an armful of clothing, and bowed quite formally.

“My lord, may I have leave to see to critical infernal business?” their fishy eyes looked up pleadingly, “I’ll have some answers for your question when we meet again.”

At least this carried the proper note of deference and attention, even if it fell pitifully short of Beelzebub’s intentions for the evening. 

Zie gave a resigned sigh. “Fine, go. But that’s a promise to meet again, and you’ll be a damned fool if you don’t make good on it.”

And in Hell, _damned fool_ was hardly an idle threat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title: Nightswimming by REM, misheard lyrics


	5. A Stranger in an Open Car...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our favorite dorky demon finally gets over herself! And goes out and has some fun. And some drinks. And does stuff that will embarrass the hell out of her in the morning. 
> 
> Note please the change in rating to Explicit. Much love to my beta reader who gave great recommendations and was wonderfully patient.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final pronoun note: From here on out I will be using she/her pronouns for Dagon, Beelzebub will be zie/zir and most demons will use they/them. My headcanon remains that they/them is the usual standard in hell unless someone specifically expresses an opinion for something else. Beelzebub is a special case because: royalty so everyone knows zir pronouns. You might sometimes get people who don't know Dagon well defaulting to they/them.

There were, of course, nightclubs in Hell. 

In point of fact, nightclubs were invented in Hell, long before they ever existed on earth, as a proving ground for all sorts of temptations and miseries. Roughly what you’d expect: Lust, drunkenness, jealousy, despair. Hell’s demons even invented karaoke, though it would be a few centuries before the audio technology caught up and the whole concept really took off.

* * *

In the early part of the 19th century, most of Hell’s nightclubs were early experiments in what would soon become the cabaret. A cavernous space, dim and dark in the corners, with a brightly lit stage in the center where dancing girls and assorted sideshow performers held court. Most of the performers were not, in fact, demons, but rather souls recently condemned. As a result the quality of entertainment was generally excellent, as the alternative to the stage was a solid stint in the brimstone pits. The stage show this particular evening was a selection of commedia del’arte skits, and a rowdy crowd was gathering, shoulder-to-shoulder near the stage and at the bar; the press of demons tapering off into the dimly lit corners.

Beelzebub stood alone at the bar. Despite the crowd, no one was bumping elbows as if zie was in a bubble; only the bartender dared approach. Zie was dressed rather smartly, in a dark grey tailed jacket, high collared ruffled shirt, snug sailor-button breeches that were in fashion on Earth a good 20 years back. The cloud of flies about zir head caught the lantern-light in a flickering orange halo. 

Dagon screwed up her courage. How hard could it really be to admit you wanted someone? Well… terribly fucking hard, especially when she put it in those words. But Dagon had done hard things before. She could steel herself, have a good stiff drink, and probably fail miserably and awkwardly. But she could make herself try.

“Hullo,’ she stepped seamlessly through the invisible barricade, into spot that seemed to be reserved just for her. Trying to hide her nerves, she spoke first to the bartender,“Can I get a bourbon on the rocks?”

Beelzebub appraised her for a moment, before leaning in to buzz in her ear “This isn’t usually your scene, why aren’t you at the office? You finally feel like answering my question?”

Swallowing down the butterflies in her chest, Dagon returned a cold, toothy grin. “I needed a drink. I was… out of… liquor.” 

Beelzebub tilted her head and gave an eyeroll that said, clearly, _We both know that you could magick yourself a barrel of Kentucky’s finest on a whim. You’re not here for a drink._ Zie sighed, exchanged a series of complicated hand gestures with the bartender and whistled. About 30 flies flew off the sticky bottles of mixers on the back bar to join the flock. 

“Come on, lets find some place we can talk…” Zie grabbed Dagon’s hand and wound them through the gathering crowd to a back corner table so deep in the shadows it was almost invisible. 

There was a single loveseat, backed up against the wall, and when Dagon went to grab a chair from another table, Beelzebub impatiently snapped and it disappeared. The message was loud and clear: fuck your sly escapes. If you came here to be tempted, we’ll sit together. Dagon sat down somewhat stiffly, silently chiding herself to relax, _this sort of thing was supposed to be fun._ Beelzebub shed zir jacket, and slumped down next to her, frightfully close. Zir eyes caught just a tiny bit of candlelight and glittered like gemstones. Dagon felt herself melt just the littlest bit. 

“I’ve been thinking of you…” the voice in her ear buzzed, “I’ll guess that you’ve been thinking of me too or you wouldn’t have tracked me down. “ 

The soft buzz behind the words sent a pleasant shiver down her spine. But she was saved from responding, as a demon materialized out of the darkness in front of them. A girlish demon with a skirt tucked up high enough to cause an earthly scandal showing off impossibly long legs. 

“Can I get you folkx anything?” She sneered sweetly.

Dagon gulped her drink in a single go, while Beelzebub ordered an appetizer of sautéed death-caps and a charcuterie plate. 

“Another bourbon. Neat.” Dagon growled. She forced her voice back into a more conversational tone before replying bravely, “I’m sorry, you were thinking of me? Why in hell…”

“You made an imprezzzion. I mean, really, what kind of demon stripzz naked and goes swimming in your pond on a first date? And then bolts for a work meeting afterwards? Rude. Downright uncivilized.”

Dagon regretted having finished off that bourbon before the next one had arrived. Unhelpfully, she blurted out “That was a date?” The words hung in the air.

In place of a reply, Beelzebub’s fingers ran lightly up the inseam of her trousers. A terrifying touch that held the promise of both absolution and temptation. Absolution for all the wrong words, absolution for every awkward misstep, for being miserable at even this most commonplace sin. And temptation….

“Don’t,” she whispered feebly. “Please don’t.”

The fingers continued to trace their infernal path.

“Why not?” The words buzzed in her head, soothing away her doubts, and she wondered for a moment whether they had been magicked into her understanding, or actually spoken aloud. Did it really matter?

Dagon slipped an arm behind Beezebub’s shoulder, and leaned in close to zir ear, “Because I want it,” she brushed her lips over zir cheekbone, “and I’m scared. It’s going to fuck up everything…” _everything I’ve worked so hard for! You’re going to make it all too fucking complicated!_

“Don't pretend you've never been tempted.”

_It’s not that easy,_ Dagon thought to herself, but out loud replied “Different sins.”

She was hardly innocent, they’d been a fertility god once for heavens sake. But that was more about the messy human mechanics. She’d had known there were Sins behind it all: Lust, jealousy, passion, revenge… but they weren’t **her** sins. Pretty much everyone in Heaven or Hell knew that Dagon’s weaknesses laid elsewhere. Glory. Control. Power. 

Lust just couldn’t compete. Until suddenly it seemed like the only sin in existence. 

“Different sins?” Beelzebub repeated, then chuckled. 

She reached up with a slightly trembling hand and touched zir cheek, Beelzebub just gave her a soft smile in response, almost like permission. Gently she traced fingers around the edges of the sores on zir face. “Forgive me,” she whispered under her breath, and kissed zir on the lips. Giving in, Dagon realized with a start, felt an awful lot like Falling; suspended for that sickening moment between Hell and Heaven before letting this new Sin wash over her.

She pulled the Prince of Hell up onto her lap and buried her face in zir neck, pressing her lips into the tender spot behind zir ear, and resting there for a long moment, basking in the smell of sulfur and the buzz of The Swarm. And then she was overcome, loosening zir cravat and tearing the top few buttons of zir shirt open and resting her cheek against the flat of zir chest. Zie had a heart, she could feel it against her skin.

“Please… it was a pitiful whine and she knew it, but the other words were gone now.

Beelzebub pushed zirself away, just a few inches that felt like a chasm, zir voice sparking with sarcasm, “Pleaze what? Pleaze let me go? The office is calling? War is ever so needy. I've got filezzz that need attention at 2am?”

“Please,” she met Beelzebub's glittery eyes, her voice was urgent and vulnerable, but no longer pleading, “let me have you.”

The smile she received in return was downright wicked, Beelzebub tipped zir head down so their foreheads touched “All you had to do was ask zilly.”

If only any of this were so easy.

* * *

“Touch me, “ Beelzebub murmured, in a voice that was less a command than a plea.

I am thought Dagon, acutely aware of exactly where their skin touched, fingers on back of neck, hand on waist, and where exactly their bodies were separated by the thinnest millimeters of fabric. But then. Oh! She understood.

Dagon fumbled with the buttons on zir fall-front trousers, while at the same time, conjuring up a heavy cloud of smoke to obscure them from the rest of the bar. Beelzebub whined impatiently and wiggled into her shoulder as her fingers gently traced a trail of soft hairs down into a thicket of coarser ones. She had a good guess of what she’d find, but you never quite knew with demons did you? She drew out the of anticipation, tempting, enjoying the weight of the demon in her lap, the little noises zie made, until Beelzebub couldn’t take it anymore and whined a buzzy “PLeazzzzz” in her ear, soft and close.

Zie gasped when her fingers found the slick wet of zir slit, slowly exploring the folds, holding her breath at the satisfied gasp when her finger finally circled zir clit. Still teasing, using every touch to judge what zie liked best, where her fingers found a pause and a breath, and where they found trembles and whimpers.

And then Beelzebub was pulling at her hand, licking it clean, zir tongue dancing across fingertips, dipping into the cleft between fingers. Dagon was momentarially confused until the demon shifted her weight, turned zir back, and straddled Dagon’s lap, folding zir feet under zir on the couch. Zie shoved Dagon’s hand back into zir pants, the message was an unmistakable invitation.

Very suddenly, though, the waitress with the gorgeous legs stepped through the dark cloud with a plate of food. Dagon froze. 

“Your charcuterie, my lords. And a refill on the bourbon.” Her face gave a quick flicker of recognition, as she placed the food on the table in front of them and then paused; presumably she was supposed to talk them through the variety of meats and cheeses. Beelzebub squirmed impatiently. The waitress frowned at the table, then met Dagon’s eye, gave a surreptitious thumbs up and then disappeared again into the smoke. 

Dagon realized with a flash of pride and humiliation exactly what this must have looked like, even partially obscured by the table. The Prince of Hell, sprawled lewdly on her lap, disheveled and swarming with flies. And the picture in her head, set her mind absolutely aflame for a few seconds before the writhing, mewling demon in her arms demanded all her attention again. 

Her cunt-slick fingers stroked and probed, mapping out the touches that made Beelzebub moan and tremble. Zie gave an unexpectedly loud cry, and Dagon’s reaction was feral and instinctive, clapping a hand over zir mouth, growling “Shut up” as if zie was some snot-nosed lackey. 

Beelzebub, gagged, tossed zir head back, gripped desperate fingers into her thighs and ground zir crotch into her hand in response. 

Dagon leaned down and nipped sharp teeth at zir ear, drawing just a few drops of blood and purring more softly, “”You want to cum?”

The prince of hell nodded zir head enthusiastically, under Dagon’s hands. Dagon slipped fingers into zir dripping wet cunt, stroking zir clit with her thumb, until Beelzebub was absolutely trembling. 

She whispered in the demon’s ear “Go on then…” And then zie finally let go, shuddering and quaking in her arms in her arms. 

“Obedient little devil, aren’t you? You ready to be quiet now?” Zie nodded again but weakly this time, and Dagon uncovered zir mouth.

Suddenly animated again, Beelzebub flipped on her like a viper and started covering her face in kissses. Dagon lay back , stunned and bit exhausted, and let the unexpected affection wash over her. 

“Your turn?” The voice in her ear was soft and buzzy and while it sounded tempting….

“No,” Dagon shook her head, “too many people.”

Zie nibbled at her ear, making a shiver go down her spine and settle, all fluttery, in her stomach. “No one has to know. No one even noticed. Come on, it would be bad manners to leave you unsatisfied.”

_No one had noticed except the waitress. _Dagon didn’t have even the tiniest bit of trust in Beelzebub’s discretion.__

__“Unsatisfied?” Sharp teeth nipped at Beelzebub’s ear. “Wouldn’t you rather leave me dreaming about what you owe me?”_ _

__Zie gave a tiny shiver, “I’d rather not leave you.”_ _

__Dagon couldn’t rightly wrap her mind around what had happened. But in this dark smoky dancehall, with the Prince of Hell snuggled up in her arms, she knew more than anything else that she wanted just this, again and again, for the rest of eternity._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title: Love is a Stranger by The Eurythmics


	6. And The Devil is Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Beelzebub is an impatient brat who hates to be left hanging. Containing painfully awkward flirting and quirky demon anatomy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi dear readers. This is the end to this story. I have a lot of other little disconnected bits buzzing around in partially written form, but the task of lacing those all together into a coherent long narrative is not doable in my life right now. This is the longest single thing I've written and fully edited to my satisfaction, so I'm going to quit while I'm ahead.

“I don’t trust zir,” Dagon frowned into her tumbler of melting ice, The Prince of Hell was jerking her around somehow. She just knew it. Ever since that very first night, she’d felt off kilter, on edge… on the lookout for what ever it was she was being tricked into. “Zie must be up to something, or want something or have… plans.”

It wasn’t always work that kept Dagon late at the office. A good chunk of her department’s upper management were also good friends. (In point of fact, Dagon would be hard pressed to name a friend who didn’t work for her.) And it wasn’t unusual for them to hang out late, drinking and chatting. Not as if of them slept. Or had much of a life outside their work and the occasional embarrassing dance party. Nights were more of an extended coffee break. Only with vodka and whiskey in place of coffee. There had been a handful of them to start out with that evening, but, a couple of their auditors had been called away to deal with an urgent accounting involving warring families in Northern Italy. Their new accountant Edda had left early as they were couchbreaking their hellhound pup (“When is he ever going to learn to stop pissing in the yard?”). And eventually the gathering had whittled down to just Ligur and Dagon… plus a jar of Bayou moonshine from a recent trip to New Orleans.

“Does it change anything if zie does have ‘plans’?” Ligur replied, surprisingly insightful for once. “You seem pretty sweet on zir, regardless”

“Sweet?” Dagon spat the word like it was poison. “I’m not sweet on zir, I’d fuck zir again in a heartbeat, but that’s…”

“Naw, mate,” Ligur cut her off, “Your voice goes all soft when you talk about zir, and you get a dumb look on your face. You’re into them.”

No one else probably could have gotten away with saying that, but Ligur was too dumb to make things up, and too smart to lie to her. “Maybe… but I guess that just means I have to watch zir more closely for whatever zie’s up to.”

Ligur took a long drink of the moonshine like it was water. “Maybe zie just wants to get in your pants. You know someone can just be into you too. It’s kinda nice.”

Dagon scoffed, “Beelzebub, Prince of Hell, Lord of the Flies isn’t a dopey idiot like Hastur.”

“Pffftttt, if you’re throwing titles around boss, at least call him Duke Hastur.” His chameleon rolled it’s eyes in mock exasperation.

“Yeah, but my point stands. Zie is up to something.” A fly landed on her nose. She took another sip of moonshine and it fainted from the harsh fumes then passed out in her drink. A few more flies buzzed in, all gamboling happily around her head. One landed on the edge of her glass to check on it’s friend, and promptly tumbled in to join him. Dagon swung her feet off her desk and straightened her waistcoat. 

There was a light knock on the half-open door, “Working late againzzz?” 

Ligur's simply acknowledged zir with a nod and a tip of his glass. “Lord Beelzebub.”

Dagon wasn’t quite sure the right note to take. Deferential? Casual? Instead she stumbled over her words. “My Prince, uh… not, not really, we were just… recounting the deeds of the… uh… month.” 

Ligur frowned, “We’re just shooting the shit. I mean, metaphorically, not literally. That would be… well…”. For an otherwise talented linguist he had an absolutely terrible handle on figurative language. He knew just enough to talk himself into a corner then realize he was stuck there.

“Can I?” Beelzebub motioned to the jar. “What izz it?” 

“Of course, let me get you a glass,” Dagon helpfully kept a small bar in her office.

“Moonshine, Lord. From the swamps of Louisiana. Can’t entirely tell it from turpentine, but it’ll get you plenty drunk.” Ligur amiably tipped his glass again, then took a big gulp.

Zie took a sip, and zir head twitched as if zie was having a momentary seizure “Zzzzz…. That’s got a bite. Dagon, I didn’t know you’d gone to earth.”

“Not me, Ligur here,” she tipped her glass towards him “We needed a little temptation done, from someone who could handle all the languages, but he went and made a proper holiday of it.”

“Brought my wife, they loved the new cemetery. Really well done, all aboveground crypts like Paris… bodies piling up so fast that folks say they’re adding another.” He turned to Dagon, “Ran into Pestilence down there, did I mention that? Caught up over drinks. Mate’s been doing some really cracking stuff with the Yellow Fever.” 

Dagon narrowed her eyes, “Pestilence in the New World? You hadn’t told me that. I thought he was done with over there after the collapse of the Mayans. Damnit, I’m going to have to revise the geographic models.”

Ligur sighed, “I’ve been telling you, for the last few years North America’s moving faster towards the End Times than your models had predicted. War and Pestilence have been making big plans. You really should hunt them down for a meeting.” An intrusion of cockroaches skittered down the wall and up on his shoulder, making clicking noises at his ear.

“I didn’t know you can talk to the roaches?” Beelzebub seemed slightly alarmed.

Ligur shook his head, “Talk to them? Nah, mate, I can listen, but that’s about it. I don’t have the mandibles to speak it right. Anyway, I’ve got to get going.”

Beelzebub put an arm out to stop him, “Can you understand my fliezzzz?”

“Ah… that’s what you’re worried ‘bout?” He gave a broad smile, “No point in listening to flies. They don’t got much to say. A cockroach is right clever, but your flies? Not much smarter than Hastur’s maggots. Like listening to a sack of flour. Anyway, hail Satan, and catch you in the morning boss.” 

The door to Dagon’s office was perpetually hung crooked, so when it stuck in the jamb, Ligur made a particular point of jerking it all the way closed behind him with a crack and a thunk.

* * *

The Prince of Hell didn’t like to be indebted to anyone. But the Prince of Hell also wasn’t accustomed to being kept waiting. Impatience had gotten the best of zir. Again. As it always did. Zie had thought at first that Dagon would of course come by the next evening, of course a busy demon with a right proper job would be working during the day. But when three days came and went and Beelzebub found zirself hopefully back at the bar drinking zirself silly, well… despair came easy in Hell. Eventually, zie threw in the towel, and realized zie was going to have to seek Dagon out, or else wait a full century for the other demon to pull her head out of her work.

Beelzebub was not a patient creature. 

“Not much in to debt collectionzzz, are you?”

Dagon knitted her brows in confusion for a moment, and then smiled softly. “Debt collections? Oh. The other night, **that** debt. I can write it off the books, if you’d rather.”

The implication stung. “If I’d rather? Honestly, I’d rather you put me on a payment plan.”

“Payment plan?” Dagon’s gawky grin widened, her eyes slid sideways, and then she looked up to meet zir gaze. “I’d have to charge you interest of course. I could start a ledger; 30% interest, compounded daily, and it’s been what… 6 days? A whole week?”

“So you **have** been counting the days since I’ve seen you last? I’d nearly given up hope. ” Beelzebub reached over to stroke Dagon’s cheek, her skin was cool and soft, blemished only by a sprinkling of scales, “I like the sound of interest, but 30% is highway robbery.”

Dagon leaned forward just enough to grab the waist of zir trousers, toppling Beelzebub into her lap. “Stand and deliver, then!”

Beelzebub dissolved into dry giggles “Are you a highwayman now? I thought you were an accountant?”

Dagon snickered and bit her lower lip, “As long as you’re willing to pay up, they’re pretty much the same thing.”

“Well, I didn’t come here to make bad accountancy jokes, I came here to square up.” Their eyes met, and Beelzebub reached up to toy with the knot on Dagon’s cravat. “I came here to bury my face in your thighs.”

Dagon whimpered. The silly smirk disappeared from her face and she stared back with a gaze of naked need. She dug her fingers into Beelzebub’s hips. 

Zie pulled her tie loose, and started working at the collar, exposing smooth grey skin freckled with glimmering scales. Zie ran her fingers across her exposed collar bones, before very gently placing zir lips there, and then kissing up her throat, and nuzzling zir behind her ear. She smelled like the ozone of sea air and the funk of ripe-dry seaweed, both musky and clean in the same breath. 

“May I?” 

It was barely a whisper, but Dagon’s response was a throaty, “Please,” and sharp teeth nibbling at zir ear. 

A shiver of desire went down zir spine, as zie stripped off zir jacket and tossed it on desk. Beelzebub settled back into Dagon’s lap, and teasingly worked zir way down the buttons of her shirt, pausing to cup one small breast and run a finger lightly over her nipple. 

Dagon cast her head back and gave a moan, “Fuck yes.”

Beelzebub giggled, and nuzzled zir head on her chest, a few scales catching at the edges of zir scabs. Zie kissed zir way up her breast and flicked at her nipple with zir tongue. Dagon squirmed and shifted in her seat. “”You like that?”

Dagon looked zir straight in the eye, and bit down on her lip with a smile, “I want you so fucking bad.”

Beezebub giggled again, “Right here in your office?”

The door might be firmly shut, but aside from privacy, her office had nothing to recommend it in terms of romance. The flickering lamplight fell on stacks of papers, piles of old scrolls, and what looked like some old clay tablets under some of the older heaps of documents in the back corners. Dagon looked around as if with fresh eyes, and shook her head firmly no. “My apartment is right next door. Come on.” 

Indeed there was a well worn door set into a dim corner of the room. Dagon led zir down a dank corridor to a small flat tucked behind the general offices of VS & PT. Once Dagon had lit the lamps, Beelzebub saw that the whole place, small as it was, was set into the rock face behind the building, so that the back half of the apartment was walled in rock. But the rest of the room was cozy, if a bit small. There were tapestries on the walls, and a large overstuffed couch which Beelzebub settled down on while Dagon started a fire in the hearth. 

“Can I get you a drink?” 

As she swept past towards the bar, Beelzebub caught her hand and pulled her over to join zir on the couch, “I’d rather pick up right where we were.”

Dagon paused, and then sank down to sit on the couch, still holding Beelzebub’s hand, “And where were we again? You might have to remind me.”

Beelzebub smiled broadly, and pushed her to lay back, “I think,”

Zie trailed a finger down her chest, to the last closed button left, “we might have been,”

Zie unbuttoned the next button, and enjoy kissed Dagon’s belly, “just about here..”

Dagon arched her back and gave a gratifying gasp, but then, stiffened. “Wait... stop... there’s one thing you need to know...,” Dagon pushed zir away awkwardly, her too-white eyes locked with Beelzebub's. “Scales, I have scales.”

Beelzebub nodded impatiently, not understanding what she meant, but absolutely unwilling to get drawn in to discussion.

“I mean, I have scales where humans have hair, and you don’t want to rub them the wrong way. Not figuratively, literally. It hurts.” She blurted out in a rush.

“Scales, got it,” that made sense. Unusual anatomy was hardly surprising in hell, everyone was marked somehow or other. If anything, Beelzebub was far more curious than put off. Zie slipped zir hand down the thicker trail of scales that led into Dagon’s trousers. They were warm and smooth like varnish, until zie mistakenly caught an edge on zir hangnail. Dagon flinched. “I’ll do my best.”

Zie tugged at Dagon’s trousers, and she wiggled free of them, the whole of her outer pussy glistened with tightly layered scales, iridescent in the lamplight. Dagon propped herself up on her elbows to watch as Beelzebub stroked them gently. “Damn, you’re fucking beautiful. Can you feel that through the scales?”

Dagon bit her lip and shivered, “Fuck yeah... “

Beelzebub grinned up at her, and softly teased a finger into her slit. Scales gave way here, the skin beneath was soft and fleshy. Warm and wet. Mammalian. Dagon threw her head back and moaned in response. 

“I can’t promisiz I won’t fuck up, but I’ll try and be careful.” Beelzebub settled zirself down on the couch between her legs. She slowly teased apart her outer lips, gently folding back the scaled skin like a mussel blossoming open under heat. Zie trailed a finger over the curious texture at the edge edge where skin and scales met.

Dagon squirmed impatiently, and whined “You don’t have to be that careful!”

Zie leaned zir weight on her legs, holding her still, “Shhhzzzzz.... I’m going to take as long as I need, you’re just going to have to wait.” 

She answered in a whine that turned into a gasp when zie leaned in and licked at her. Her pussy smelled rich and mysterious as fermenting ambergris, and Beelzebub took zir time, slowly teasing at her folds until she was grinding against zir face and whimpering in frustration. 

Dagon reached down and grabbed a fist full of zir hair, “Please, please....”

Beelzebub, peeked up at her face which was scrunched up like this was the very best sort of torture, “Please what?”

Zie watched her eyes try to refocus, felt her fingers soften in zir hair, “Please, make me cum,” her voice was ragged, but she found it in herself to look Beelzebub straight in the eye and gasped, “my prince.”

“Always so formal,” Beelzebub hummed. And then spat, sarcastically, “It doesn’t suit you.”

A strange shadow passed over Dagon’s face, and then she broke through it with an evil grin. She pressed Beelzebub’s face into her crotch and growled, “Fine then, fuck me already, damnit!”

Beelzebub was more than happy to do exactly as told, slipping two fingers in her cunt and sucking on her clit until she was a screaming, throbbing mess. Then, with a feral scream, she went slack, satisfied, and quietly giggling. 

Beelzebub came up for air, and crawled up to plant a kiss on Dagon’s throat and nestled zir head into her shoulder. She murmured a quiet “thanks” and wrapped her arms around zir and held zir there for a long time, their bodies warm against each other, their breath rising and falling together.

After a long time, Dagon shifted slightly under zir, and Beelzebub loooked up into her fishywhite eyes. 

“Can we keep doing this?” Dagon asked simply.

Beelzebub chuckled in reply, “I was hoping so. Don’t I still owe you interezzt?”

Dagon groaned in mock annoyance, “Enough with keeping score. Can’t we just,” she leaned down and gave Beelzebub a kiss that made zir toes curl, “do this. More.”

Beelzebub kissed up her jaw line, and nibbled at her earlobe, zie could feel Dagon shiver under zir. “Hell, yes,” zie whispered softly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Title: This Monkey's Gone to Heaven by The Pixies.


End file.
